Rating

8Overall

7
Importance

8
Innovation

9
Style

Recommendation

Although it has taken decades, Alan Turing – the brilliant British mathematician, logician, World War II code breaker, computer scientist and theoretician of artificial intelligence and artificial life – has finally achieved his deserved recognition as the true father of the computer. Computer historian B. Jack Copeland details Turing’s colorful, tragic life and incredible accomplishments, portraying the awkward, eccentric scientist as an archetypal, quirky British intellectual. getAbstract recommends Copeland’s masterful telling of Turing’s astonishing life to those interested in computers, WWII, code-breaking, espionage, artificial intelligence and the political history of gay oppression.

In this summary, you will learn

Who Alan Turing was

What his primary accomplishments were

How the British government treated him post-WWII

Why speculation surrounds his death

Summary

Eccentric Genius Alan Turing was born near Paddington Station in London on June 23, 1912. The son of wealthy parents, he attended Hazelhurst, a tony boarding school. He next enrolled at Dorset’s Sherborne School, where he developed his lifelong interest in mathematics. In 1931, he gained...